Happy Birthday To Me

Today is my 63rd birthday. This is how I like to celebrate, somewhere different. I have Laura with me this year. Last year was the East Coast of Canada. Today, we are in Bergen, our last port in Norway. Bergen is a burning metropolis compared to our previous ports. We don't have a tour booked today. We are just going to 'wing it'. So out of my comfort zone.

The weather is rainy when I wake up, but it is starting to clear. Apparently, Bergen has over 200 days of rain a year. We are fortunate that the rain has stopped.

When we get off the ship, we get tickets for the hop-on hop-off bus. This will take us everywhere we want to go. We hop off first at a park by the university. It is a beautiful place area. The trees and flowers are all in bloom down this far. As we walk in, there is a pond with ducks and a water fountain. There is a little bridge to walk over the water to get to the main part of the park. The lilac bushes are still blooming here, so I can bury my nose in for a good sniff! We follow a path to another section where it opens up to a large fountain with kids run I g and playing. It looks like a school class is having lunch here. There are also other families with their children and older adults enjoying the beautiful day. The sun is out now, and we have shed our jackets.

We catch the bus again and head to the fish market. The one here is not the chaotic crowded wharf type that I have seen in other countries. This on is in a nice building and has more of a farmers market type feel. There are plenty of fish and other things from the sea to buy. They even have sea urchins that you apparently slice open clean and eat some part that is like caviar. Um, no, thank you.

Next up is the funicular up to the mountain top. At the top, we can see a large portion of Bergen and the cruise port. Yep, the ship is still here. The day has turned out great and we can get some really nice pictures.

Back down the mountain, we waited for the bus again to get us back to the ship. We have a short day in port today and have to be back on board by 4:30 PM. I'm starting to get nervous because the bus is taking g a really long time. We do make it back with 10 minutes to spare.

Tonight, we have booked the Onda restaurant for dinner. It is the Italian restaurant tucked away in the corner of the ship. In all honesty, it wasn't that great. We both had the salmon, and the portions were large but nothing special. Laura did, however, plan for a birthday cake, and the staff did sing Happy Birthday to me. This is a nice ending to the day.Leggi altro